You know hockey I can tell from your posts. You saw that Tampa forechecked us with a 2 man system. We can beat that type of forecheck game. Where we have trouble is with those Cali teams who only send in 1 guy and have 4 guys back between red line and blue line. We will see how Preds come at us but I suspect they will neutral trap us too and force us to outside walls. And then we will see if we start dat drop pass and regroup breakout again unless Keefe has made a change as you suggested. Bottom line Mitch, Matty and Tavares can't get through that system. Willy can because he can really fly and his puck strength is so much better.
If this occurs then lets blast pucks at their goalie from red line. Maybe he lets in a real bad one and we win 1-0. or Preds take a penalty when they trap and we score on PP. This is best way to play that trap for us.
Thanks bro. Drop passes were there last night. They are effective and the only smart play at times. Over use has been the issue. They didn’t over use it and forwarded the puck with less possession or nothing mentality. The reset was on and wingers timed their ice better with the defense and found good ice to collect passes. They actually still didn’t position on the wall high enough as wingers and not close enough to take as many pucks away on the wall as they could have. Still much better.
However it works out Nashville defends there seems to be a reset on how the transition will be implemented. There was speed through in to the offensive zone and less stationary players standing there dead in the water.
Seems like it will be a work in progress. Centers need to stay in there ice and wingers need to control the walls and dictate how far they want to push the defenseman on their side back by how low or how high they take the wall. I prefer mid wall for purely defense but keeping closer defensively to your net gives the dman more time to collect and shoot.
We could stand to control pucks on the wall better and players inthedefensive zone should know it is perfectly better to eat a puck on the wall instead of trying a risky play that is low percentage.
Watch Gauthier eat pucks on the wall. He is second best at it on theteam after Hyman. Wish he would hit more but i digress. They have been startingto eat pucks more. Subtle change many might miss but it is happening more and we see less low percentage pass attempts because of it. Added grind game that was completely not there has evolved recently and its effective.
Keefe adjusted well. Cat and mouse game continues because teams are scared of our offense. Fun to watch the team grow and add to their game now.
